


Looking At You

by Celia_and



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Alcohol, Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Office, Ambiguous/Open Ending, Angst, Boss/Employee Relationship, Broody boss Ben Solo, Casablanca References, Chapter 1 can stand on its own as an ambiguous/open-ended one-shot, Chapter 2 has a fluffy HEA, Drinking, Drunkenness, F/M, Happy Ending, No sexual contact under influence of alcohol, Office Party, Pining, Sassy Rey (Star Wars), Truth or Drink, Unresolved Sexual Tension
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-22
Updated: 2020-08-22
Packaged: 2021-03-06 17:35:31
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,136
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26052796
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Celia_and/pseuds/Celia_and
Summary: She takes a deep, shaky breath. “If you weren’t my boss, would you be touching me right now?”He clenches his fists. “If I weren’t your boss, I would have touched you a long time ago.”“Maybe... just tonight?”----------Rey and Ben play a late-night game of truth or drink.
Relationships: Kylo Ren/Rey, Rey/Ben Solo, Rey/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren
Comments: 38
Kudos: 577
Collections: Reylo Prompt Fills (@reylo_prompts)





	1. Drink

**Author's Note:**

  * Translation into Русский available: [Бокал за тебя](https://archiveofourown.org/works/26384425) by [Elafira](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Elafira/pseuds/Elafira)



> Inspired by the [@reylo_prompts prompt](https://twitter.com/reylo_prompts/status/1295389928595927045): “Rey and her broody boss Ben play truth or drink.”
> 
> I wrote this first chapter to stand on its own as a one-shot but later decided to continue it. The second chapter has a sweet, fluffy happy ending after a bit of an emotional roller coaster ride, but if you can stomach open-ended stories and prefer to stop at the end of the first chapter and leave the rest to your imagination, I’d honestly love that. 💛

“You can’t hide forever, you know.”

He looks up, clears his throat. “Ah. Rey. I’m not hiding.”

“You could at least turn off the overhead light to make it less obvious that you’re holed up in your office while everyone else is at the party.”

“I’ll take that under advisement.” He looks back at his monitor, probably hoping more than expecting that she’ll leave him alone.

She persists. “Or you could just come downstairs instead of hiding.”

“I thought we already established that I’m not hiding.”

She purses her lips. _“We_ didn’t establish anything. You _claim_ you’re not hiding. It’s bad form to lie to your subordinates.”

“Was there something you needed, Rey?”

“I need you to come down to the party.”

If Ben Solo ever deigned to show emotion, he would probably roll his eyes. As it is, though, he just asks, “How much have you had to drink?”

She gasps in mock outrage. “How _dare_ you imply that I’ve been drinking! At a party? Where people are _socializing?!”_

He fixes her with a level stare. “Rey.”

She pouts. “I saved my first drink to have with you.”

The ghost of a smile darts across his face. “Okay, Rick Blaine.”

“You’ve seen Casablanca?”

“Hasn’t everyone?”

She leans against the doorframe and crosses her arms, considering. “I dunno. You don’t strike me as the type.”

She has his full attention now. “What type is that?”

She swallows, his stare unexpectedly heavy on her skin. “Romantic.”

He looks away. “Well if you’ll recall, Rick was wasted when he said that. So I’m sure you’ll understand why I doubt that you’re entirely sober.”

She hums noncommittally. “You’re changing the subject. You haven’t answered either of my questions.”

“Either?”

She counts them off on her fingers. “One, why are you hiding? And two, is the big, dark, brooding boss secretly a romantic?” Her face lights up as the idea occurs to her. “But there’s a way we can find out.” She steps into his office and looks around. “Don’t you have one of those fancy glass containers of liquor?”

“A crystal decanter?”

“Whatever. You have one, right?”

“Why do you ask?”

“I’m doing an office-wide inventory of glass liquor containers. Why do you think?”

“Rey. I don’t think this is a good idea.”

She puts her hands on her hips. “Well you can either drink with me or come down to the party.”

“It’s in that cabinet,” he says, pointing.

She makes a beeline and bends over to retrieve the decanter and two glasses. “You realize it isn’t the 60’s anymore, right? What is this, Mad Men?”

He doesn’t answer, and it belatedly occurs to her that her current position gives him an unavoidable eyeful of her ass.

She straightens up and approaches his desk to set down her haul. She takes the crystal stopper out and pours a generous three fingers’ worth in each glass. She holds one out to him across the desk. He doesn’t take it.

“I don’t think this is a good idea.”

“A harmless game of truth or drink?” she asks innocently. “What’s the worst that could happen?”

“Truth or drink?” He looks quizzical. She’s never seen him look quizzical before. She’s never seen him look anything but entirely in control of any situation. She likes it.

“We take turns asking each other questions. You can either answer honestly, or if you don’t want to answer, take a drink instead.”

He doesn’t move. Her arm is getting tired from holding the heavy glass out to him.

“I’m your boss.”

“Exactly. My boss who’s not downstairs at the company party.”

“Rey.” There’s danger in his voice, right at the back. In his throat, in his chest.

She hesitates. He _is_ her boss. He could fire her for how inappropriate she’s being. Maybe she had more to drink than she thought.

He doesn’t fire her. He takes the glass slowly, never breaking eye contact.

She picks hers up, satisfied. She settles back in one of the chairs in front of his desk, shimmying a little to get comfortable. Her skirt hikes up a bit. She raises the glass to her mouth to take a drink before she remembers that she’s not supposed to yet. Because they’re playing a game.

She rests the glass on her thigh instead. “I’ll go first. Why aren’t you down at the party?”

He takes a drink without hesitation. She spots the flaw in her brilliant plan.

“Ugh, you were supposed to _answer.”_

“Isn’t that the whole point? I don’t have to?”

She scoffs. “Well, yeah. But I _wanted_ you to.”

His expression is inscrutable. “You can’t always get what you want.”

“Please,” she scoffs. “Name _one_ thing you’ve ever wanted that you haven’t gotten.”

He drinks.

“That wasn’t a ques— okay,” she shrugs. “Your turn.”

He looks like a deer in headlights. It seems not to have occurred to him that _he_ would be asking _her_ questions. He gathers himself and asks, “What’s your favorite color?”

She laughs. “Blue.” She runs her thumb along the lip of the glass. “How many times have you seen Casablanca?”

“I don’t know.”

“Ballpark estimate.”

“More than ten.”

“Hmm. That’s a big ballpark. But I’ll allow it.”

“Thank you.” The very faintest smile.

“It’s your turn,” she prompts.

“Where does your family live?” he asks, probably meaning it as a throw-away question. Small talk, like her favorite color.

She drinks.

He shifts uncomfortably in his chair. “I didn’t—”

“It’s fine.” She forces a smile. “That’s why drinking is an option instead of answering.” She winces at the aftertaste. “Ugh, that’s disgusting.”

He looks disbelieving. “It’s a twenty-year-old single malt.”

“Yeah, so? It’s gross.”

“This is one of the best scotches that money can buy.”

“Okay,” she rolls her eyes. “Here we go. You’re one of those people who pretends that liquor actually tastes good.”

“The good stuff does.”

“It doesn’t!” she insists. “It just gets you drunk faster than wine.”

“Are _you_ drunk, Rey?”

She grins and takes a drink.

“That’s not— I didn’t—” He looks frustrated.

“It’s part of the game, Solo.” She freezes as she realizes what she just calls him.

He doesn’t seem to mind. He rests his elbows on the desk. “I think it’s your turn.”

She considers. “Are you afraid of the dark?”

He scoffs. “What is this, middle school?”

“Nope,” she retorts. “If it were middle school, I would ask you who you had a crush on. Yes! That’s my question. When’s the last time you had a crush?” She laughs aloud at how silly the question is. The idea of brooding, hulking Ben Solo with a crush. Unfathomable.

He drinks.

“Your glass is empty,” she observes.

“Do you want to do something about that?” he asks, looking straight at her. Has he ever looked straight at her, before tonight? She stands so suddenly that she sways in her heels. She stumbles forward toward the desk. He lurches forward to try to catch her, but she steadies herself, puts her glass down, and spreads her hand in a _ta da_ gesture, then kicks her heels off so she doesn’t trip again. It’s entirely the fault of the heels.

Her head isn’t spinning for any other reason. Not because of how much she’s had to drink, and _certainly_ not because of him.

She picks up the decanter carefully and walks around the desk with it. She refills his glass, careful not to spill. She can’t tell, because she’s looking at the glass, but she thinks he might be watching her face instead.

Her mission accomplished, she sets the decanter back down on the corner of the desk. He’s very close, suddenly. When did he get so close?

“You’re drunk,” he says lowly.

“You’re not,” she retorts.

He downs the entire glass, never breaking eye contact.

She bites her lip as she smirks. She refills his glass again, standing in her party dress and her bare feet practically between his knees.

He doesn’t drink this time. He looks up at her.

Her mouth is dry, suddenly. “It’s your turn,” she says, even though she doesn’t remember whether it is or not.

“Why did you leave the party to come find me?”

She whirls slowly away from him. She meanders to the doorway, thinking. Her hips swing, and he’s watching, and she lets her hips swing because he’s watching.

She stops just inside the door and turns back to face him. “I don’t know,” she says honestly. “Are you glad I did?”

“Yes,” he croaks hoarsely.

“Good.” She sucks her bottom lip into her mouth. “Do you want me to turn the light off?” Her finger hovers over the switch.

“It’s not your turn to ask,” he objects.

“Fine.” She waits.

His eyes darken. “Do you want me to want you to turn the light off?”

“Yes. Do you want me to turn the light off?”

“Yes.”

She flicks the switch.

The only source of light is his monitor. She can see him in its harsh white glow but he can’t see her well, backlit as she is by the distant light from the empty hallway.

He clicks on his desk lamp. He looks up at her.

It all feels different, now.

She walks back to her chair, slowly. She sits down. She picks up her glass. And she looks at him. She doesn’t wait for a question. She drinks.

He raises his glass, silently toasting her.

“Wait!” she exclaims suddenly. “You have to say it!”

“What?”

She scoffs. “Mr. I’ve-seen-Casablanca-over-ten-times. You know what.”

She means it as a joke. She thinks he’ll take it as one. He should smile, he shouldn’t look at her with the intensity that pours from his eyes. He raises his glass. “Here’s looking at you, kid.”

She doesn’t drink. Her head is starting to get fuzzy, and she wants to be able to watch him watching her.

He sets his empty glass down. “What do you want?”

“I don’t understand the question.”

“Tonight. Tomorrow. Ever.” It’s still not a question that she can answer. She drinks, not even because of the game anymore but because she needs to have something hard between her lips.

“Do you want to kiss me?” she asks. It’s not an offer. There’s still a desk between them. It’s just a question.

He refills his glass. He takes a drink. She’s disappointed.

 _Then_ he looks at her. Then he says it. “Yes.”

The word sits on the desk between them, taking up more and more air until she can hardly breathe.

She stands up. She sets her glass down and walks around the desk, and this time she needs to run her hand along it because her feet aren’t cooperating, even without the heels. He turns toward her. She comes to stand between his feet. She doesn’t reach out to him. He’s too expensive for her. She needs to wait for him to want her.

But he doesn’t. He looks— _oh,_ how he looks—but he doesn’t touch.

She takes a deep, shaky breath. “If you weren’t my boss, would you be touching me right now?”

He clenches his fists. “If I weren’t your boss, I would have touched you a _long_ time ago.”

“Maybe...just tonight?”

With supreme effort, he shakes his head. “You’re drunk.”

The anger rises quickly. “Then why’d you tell me? That you want me?”

His eyes devour. “I had to, once in my life. And because I’m betting that you won’t remember this tomorrow.”

She sways but stays upright. “Then tell me. Tell me things.”

“What things?”

“What you wanna say but you don’ say.” The room is spinning. He stands to catch her as she stumbles.

He helps her back to her desk. He carries her shoes. He helps her call Rose to come upstairs and get her. It wouldn’t do for her to be found in his office. It would look like something had happened, and after all, nothing did.

Absolutely nothing at all.

She slumps in her desk chair, eyes blurry, waiting for Rose and a cab and her apartment and her empty bed. But before he leaves, she reaches out and grabs his hand. “Tell me,” she insists.

He kneels down beside her. He smooths her hair from her face with one big, warm hand. His thumb caresses her cheek.

When he says it, it’s in a whisper.

“I wish I didn’t love you so much.”


	2. Truth

**One Year Later**

His office door is open, but she knocks anyway.

“Rey?” He pushes his chair back from the desk and stands up. “Why aren’t you down at the party?”

“On my way.” She hesitates. “I just wanted to thank you. For everything.”

He swallows. “I’ve never done anything to be thanked for.”

“That’s not true,” she says earnestly. “You’ve been a good boss. A great boss. I’ve learned so much here. I...thank you.”

He flexes his hand, unconsciously, she thinks. “You’re welcome.”

“Okay.” She points a thumb awkwardly in the direction of the elevator. “I guess I’ll head downstairs, then. Are you coming?”

He shakes his head.

“I guess this is goodbye?”

He nods jerkily.

She looks at him one last time and turns away. She walks to the elevator bank and presses the button. She listens to the distant dings approaching.

The elevator doors open.

She’s already halfway back down the hall.

The carpet muffles her tread, so he doesn’t hear her approach. She reaches the doorway with her knuckles poised to knock again, but the sight that awaits stops her.

The overhead light is off. The desk lamp casts a yellow light. Ben’s elbows rest on the desk, his sleeves rolled up. His head is buried in his hands. Emotion of any kind feels out of place in an office building, let alone this...pain? Misery?

She must make some kind of noise, or else he feels her stare like a hand on his hair. He looks up. She shies away, not wanting to intrude on...this. Whatever it is.

“Rey?”

She steels herself and crosses the threshold. “There was one other thing.” She doesn’t understand the heartrending hope that lights his eyes. She looks down and away. “About last December—”

“Yes?” he asks quickly.

She flushes. “I don’t remember. Much. I know I was drunk, and whatever I said was probably inappropriate. I wanted to thank you for never mentioning it, after.”

“Of course.” A muscle twitches in his jaw. “It was nothing.”

“Of course,” she echoes.

There’s something about the lamp that tugs at her memory. Something about the cabinet that stands ajar, and the crystal decanter that peeks out. Something about bare feet, and desire sharp enough to stab.

“You—” she takes a step toward him.

Images come in flashes. She has a few pieces of the puzzle, but she can’t see what picture they make. It feels terribly important that she find out.

She looks at him. “We drank...together? And I sat here.” She touches the back of the chair.

“We talked about Casablanca. You asked what my favorite color was. I refilled your glass.”

He doesn’t speak. He hangs on her every word. It doesn’t even look like he’s breathing.

“I took my shoes off. I turned off the light. You said I was drunk.”

She walks around the desk, slowly. Trailing her fingers along the wood not because she needs to, this time. Because she can.

“You said you wanted to kiss me. But you wouldn’t. You wouldn’t touch me.”

He turns in his chair. She comes to stand in front of him.

“You wouldn’t touch me, because I was drunk.” The puzzle is complete. Right?

She can see the rise and fall of his chest through his shirt. He stands. Even in her heels she has to look up to meet his eyes. “That’s all you remember?”

She nods. “Was there something else?”

She wraps her fingers around his bare wrist. He looks down at it, quickly, then back at her face. He doesn’t say yes or no. He doesn’t nod or shake his head. He doesn’t even touch her. He just bends down and kisses her.

His lips are too perfectly soft against hers, too plush. It feels too good. She moans against him. She clutches his sleeves.

“Rey,” he breaks the kiss to gasp. “You remember?”

“We played truth or drink,” she says. “You kept drinking because you didn’t want to answer.”

She threads her arms around the back of his neck and smiles up at him. “Why didn’t you want to answer?”

His hands cradle her back. “There were things I couldn’t tell you.”

She kisses his jaw. “But you can now.”

His Adams apple bobs.

“Because now I don’t work for you anymore.” She presses her body against his, or maybe he tugs her against him. It doesn’t matter which. She kisses him deeply. “Come home with me. Take me home.”

It doesn’t matter which.

He’s shaking his head. Why is he shaking his head? “I can’t.”

“What?” she pulls back, lets go of him. Fear grips her chest. How did she get this so, so wrong? “Why?”

“Because there’s something you don’t remember.”

“Then tell me.” She feels cold without his body against hers.

“I don’t think it’s something you want to know.”

“Why not?”

“You remember everything except that.”

“Tell me.”

“I can’t.”

She can’t read his face. “Why not?”

“Because it’s not true anymore.”

There’s something, _something_ at the back of her mind—something that doesn’t fit in the puzzle of the office and its yellow light.

“Tell me.”

He takes a deep breath. “I said, ‘I wish I didn’t love you so much.’”

She takes a step back. “You loved me?”

He nods silently.

Her heart thuds against her ribs. “But you don’t anymore?”

“I used to hate it, how quickly I fell in love with you. I hated how you were the first thing I thought about in the morning, and the last thing at night. I hated how my life was better just because you were near me. I didn’t want to love you. I tried to stop. _Fuck,_ I tried.”

There’s a trembling that starts in her fingers.

“Then I realized something. That even if I never told you, even if you could never love me back, loving you made me a better person. So I’m not sorry. I love you, Rey, and I’m not sorry.”

The trembling has made its way to her knees, and her breath, and her chin. But her eyes are clear and her voice is steady, when she says:

“You finally answered my question. From last year. Remember?”

He stares. “What question?”

She takes a step toward him, then another. She looks in his eyes and sees family. She smiles through tears.

“Ben Solo, you _are_ a romantic.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I so hope you enjoyed! I do much of my writing on [Twitter](https://twitter.com/CeliaAnd2) nowadays and would love it if you want to come visit! 💛


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